Aalborg Universitet

Catastrophic Failure and Fault-Tolerant Design of IGBT Power Electronic Converters -

An Overview
Wu, Rui; Blaabjerg, Frede; Wang, Huai; Liserre, Marco; Iannuzzo, Francesco

Published in:
Proceedings of the 39th Annual Conference of the IEEE Industrial Electronics Society, IECON 2013

DOI (link to publication from Publisher):

10.1109/IECON.2013.6699187

Publication date:
2013

Document Version
Early version, also known as pre-print

Link to publication from Aalborg University

Citation for published version (APA):

Wu, R., Blaabjerg, F., Wang, H., Liserre, M., & Iannuzzo, F. (2013). Catastrophic Failure and Fault-Tolerant
Design of IGBT Power Electronic Converters - An Overview. In Proceedings of the 39th Annual Conference of
the IEEE Industrial Electronics Society, IECON 2013. (pp. 507-513). IEEE Press. DOI:
10.1109/IECON.2013.6699187

General rights
Copyright and moral rights for the publications made accessible in the public portal are retained by the authors and/or other copyright owners
and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights.

? Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research.
? You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain
? You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal ?
Take down policy
If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us at vbn@aub.aau.dk providing details, and we will remove access to
the work immediately and investigate your claim.

Downloaded from vbn.aau.dk on: November 15, 2016

 Catastrophic Failure and Fault-Tolerant Design of
IGBT Power Electronic Converters - An Overview
Rui Wu, Frede Blaabjerg, Huai Wang, Marco Liserre
Center of Reliable Power Electronics (CORPE)
Department of Energy Technology, Aalborg University
Pontoppidanstraede 101, 9220 Aalborg, Denmark
rwu@et.aau.dk, fbl@et.aau.dk, hwa@et.aau.dk,
mli@et.aau.dk
AbstractReliability is one of the key issues for the
application of Insulated Gate Bipolar Transistors (IGBTs) in
power electronic converters. Many efforts have been devoted to
the reduction of IGBT wear out failure induced by accumulated
degradation and catastrophic failure triggered by single-event
overstress. The wear out failure under field operation could be
mitigated by scheduled maintenances based on lifetime
prediction and condition monitoring. However, the catastrophic
failure is difficult to be predicted and thus may lead to serious
consequence of power electronic converters. To obtain a better
understanding of catastrophic failure of IGBTs, the state-of-the-
art research on their failure behaviors and failure mechanisms is
presented in this paper. Moreover, various fault-tolerant design
methods, to prevent converter level malfunctions in the event of
IGBT failure, are also reviewed.
KeywordsInsulated Gate Bipolar Transistor; catastrophic
failure; fault torlerant circuit; power electronics
I. INTRODUCTION
Nowadays, power electronics play an important role in
motor drives, utility interfaces with renewable energy sources,
power transmission (e.g. high-voltage direct current systems,
and flexible alternating current transmission systems), electric
or hybrid electric vehicles and many other applications.
Therefore, the reliability of power electronics becomes more
and more vital, and should draw more attention [1]. According
to a survey, semiconductor failure and soldering joints failure
in power devices take up 34% of power electronic system
failures [2]. Another survey shows that around 38% of the
faults in variable-speed ac drives are due to failure of power
devices [3]. A recent questionnaire on industrial power
electronic systems also showed that all the responders regard
power electronic reliability as an important issue, and 31% of
the responders selected the semiconductor power device as
the most fragile component [4]. It can be seen that studying the
reliability of power devices is important.
Insulated Gate Bipolar Transistors (IGBTs) are hybrid
bipolar-metal-oxide semiconductor, which have the advantages
of low on-state resistance, voltage control of the gate and wide
safe operating area. IGBTs are also one of the most critical
components as well as the widely used power devices in power
electronic systems in the range above 1 kV and 1 kW.
According to the survey, the most used power devices for
Francesco Iannuzzo
Department of Electric and Information Engineering
University of Cassino and southern Lazio
Via G. Di Biasio, 43 03043 Cassino, Italy
iannuzzo@unicas.it
industrial applications are IGBTs [4]. Therefore it is worth
investigating IGBTs failure and exploring the solutions to
improve the reliability of IGBT power electronic converters.
The failure of IGBTs can be generally classified as
catastrophic failure and wear out failure. IGBT wear out failure
is mainly induced by accumulated degradation with time, while
catastrophic failure is triggered by single-event overstress, such
as overvoltage, overcurrent, overheat and so on. Prognostics
and Health Management (PHM) method can monitor the
degradation of IGBTs and estimate wear out failure [5].
However, PHM is not applicable for catastrophic failure, which
is more difficult to be predicted.
Several overview papers have covered the topics on IGBT
failure and fault diagnosis, and protection methods [6-12].
In [6], C. Busca et al discuss the major wear out failure
mechanisms of IGBTs in wind power application. It covers the
bond wire lift-off, solder joint fatigue and bond wire heel
cracking due to coefficients of thermal expansion (CTEs)
mismatch, aluminum reconstruction, and cosmic ray induced
failure for IGBT modules. The fretting damage, spring fatigue,
spring stress relaxation and cosmic ray induced failure of press-
pack IGBTs are summarized. The aforementioned failure
mainly occurs due to long time operation or power/thermal
cycling, which can be classified as wear out failure, while no
catastrophic failure is investigated.
In [7], M. Ciappa gives a comprehensive overview on
IGBT module wear out failure mechanisms, such as bond wire
fatigue, aluminum reconstruction, substrate cracking,
interconnections corrosion, and solder fatigue and voids, while
IGBT catastrophic failure is not discussed in detail except for
the mechanism of latch-up. In particular, the bond wire lift-off
mechanism is also discussed and modeled in [8].
In [9], S. Yang et al review the condition monitoring for
semiconductor devices in power electronic converters. Some
general failure mechanisms of power devices are also
described. Bond wire lift-off and solder fatigue are investigated
in detail, while only latch-up, gate oxide breakdown are
mentioned for IGBT catastrophic failure. Diagnosis and
prognosis methods for power devices degradation are also
investigated.
 Fig. 1. Overview of IGBT catastrophic failure.
In [10], J. Flicker et al discuss IGBT failure in detail,
including all wear out failure mechanisms mentioned above, as
well as some catastrophic short-circuit failure mechanisms.
However, the failure mechanisms such as second breakdown,
high voltage breakdown and the open-circuit catastrophic
failure have not been covered.
IGBT failure is also generally mentioned in references [11]
and [12], which are more focused on IGBT fault diagnosis,
detection and protection methods.
As discussed above, previous review papers on IGBT
failure are mainly focused on wear out failure. A detailed and
comprehensive review on IGBT catastrophic failure is still
lacking, though. Moreover, it is also worth having an overview
on the fault-tolerant designs to deal with or isolate IGBT
catastrophic failure in power electronic converters.
Therefore, the aim of this paper is to provide an unbiased
review of the major types of IGBT catastrophic failure due to
overstresses and the corresponding fault-tolerant designs to
deal with the failure at converter level. The paper is organized
as follows: Section II classifies the IGBT catastrophic failure
types. Section III summarizes the catastrophic failure of IGBTs
in terms of failure mode and failure mechanism. Section IV
discusses modern redundancy techniques for catastrophic
failure tolerance. The detailed mechanisms of the fault tolerant
circuits are also illustrated. The concluding remarks are
summarized in Section V.
II. CLASSIFICATION OF IGBT CATASTROPHIC FAILURE
IGBT catastrophic failure behaviors can be classified as
open-circuit failure and short-circuit failure. Normally, open-
circuit failure is considered as not fatal to converters, since the
converter can operate with lower quality of output. On the
contrary, short-circuit failure is almost fatal to converters, as
the uncontrolled short-circuit current may destroy the failed
IGBT and/or other components in the circuit. IGBT
catastrophic failure can be classified as shown in Fig. 1.
Fig.2. Time-sequence classification of IGBT short-circuit failure.
A. Open-circuit Failure
IGBT open-circuit failure can happen after external
disconnection due to vibration, as well as bond wires lift-off or
rupture due to high short-circuit current. It may lead to
pulsating current, output current/voltage distortion, and result
in secondary failure of other components after some time.
Open-circuit can also be due to absence of gate drive signal.
The common reasons could be the damage of components in
drivers and the disconnection between driver board and IGBTs.
B. Short-circuit Failure
IGBT short-circuit failure modes can be classified with
respect to time-sequence as shown in Fig. 2 [13]. IGBT short
circuit during turn-on can be caused by high gate voltage and
external failure. Failure during on-state may be caused by static
latch-up or the rapid increase of intrinsic temperature caused by
second breakdown, as well as by energy shocks. Failure during
turn-off can be caused by dynamic latch-up and high voltage
breakdown. Failure during off-state may be due to thermal
runaway phenomenon. The detailed failure mechanisms will be
illustrated in the next section.
III. IGBT CATASTROPHIC FAILURE MECHANISMS
Generally, catastrophic failure mechanisms are more
related to semiconductor physics and overstress working
conditions. As mentioned in Fig. 1, there are two failure
mechanisms of open-circuit and four of short-circuit failure.
A. Open-circuit Failure Mechanisms
IGBT open-circuit failure is not fatal to the converter
immediately, but may result in secondary failure in other
devices and the converter. The mechanisms are as follows:
1) Bond wire lift-off or rupture.
Bond wire lift-off failure can happen after short-circuit
failure. It is generally due to mechanical reasons. The main
mechanisms are related to mismatch of coefficients of thermal
expansion (CTEs) between Silicon and Aluminum, together
with high temperature gradients. Crack initiates at the
periphery of the bonding interface, and the bond wire finally
lifts-off when crack propagates to the weaker central bond area
[14]. Central emitter bond wires normally fail first, and then
the survivor bond wires follow. Another failure mechanism is
bond wire rupture, which is slower than lift-off and usually
observed after long power cycling tests [7].
2) Gate driver failure.
 There are various causes of gate driver failure, such as
power stage devices (e.g. BJTs or MOSFETs) damaged; wires
between drive board and IGBT disconnected [15]. The driver
failure may result in IGBT intermittent misfiring, degraded
output voltage, and overstress of other IGBTs and capacitors.
Abnormal work conditions in power terminals of IGBT can
also lead to driver failure. Continued narrow overvoltage spikes
between collector and emitter may open the gate-emitter
resistance, while over-current of IGBTs collector may lead to
gate-emitter resistance degradation [16]. Gate open-circuit
failure can result in thermal runaway or high power dissipation
[17]; however detailed research on the physical failure
mechanism is still lacking. Moreover, modern IGBTs can work
at 175C junction temperature, which means the case
temperature could reach 100C or more, while most
components in the driver cannot work normally at such high
temperature. Thus this is a challenge for gate driver working at
high temperature.
B. Short-circuit Failure Mechanisms
IGBT short-circuit failure can lead to potential destruction
to the failed IGBT, remaining IGBTs, and other components,
as it induces uncontrolled high current through the circuit. As
shown in Fig.1, short-circuit failure can be classified as the
following four different types.
1) High voltage breakdown.
High voltage spikes induced by high falling rate of
collector current (IC) and stray inductance can destroy IGBT
during turn-off, especially under repetitive spikes [18,19]. Due
to the high turn-off voltage spike, electric field can reach the
critical field and break down one or a few IGBT cells first, and
lead to high leakage current as well as high local temperature.
Subsequently, the heat-flux radially diffuses from the over-
heated region to the neighboring cells. Collector-emitter
voltage (VCE) collapses after the voltage spike, and then IC rises
again. Also, the gate terminal may also fail, which results in
gate voltage (VGE) rising up.
High value of VCE and VGE can also lead to short-circuit
during turn-on. An abrupt destruction and peak current happen
after several microseconds during turn-on. The hole current
caused by avalanche generation concentrates on a certain point
(usually high-doped p+ region). The destruction point is always
located at the edge of the active area close to devices
peripheral region [20]. Therefore, it is critical to clamp VGE and
VCE during switching transients.
2) Static/ dynamic latch-up.
Latch-up is a condition where the collector current can no
longer be controlled by the gate voltage. With respect to Fig. 3,
latch-up happens when the parasitic NPN transistor is turned
on, and works together with the main PNP transistor as
thyristor, and then the gate loses control of IC. IGBT latch-up
can be divided into two types, static and dynamic latch-up [21].
Static latch-up happens at high collector currents, which
turn on the parasitic NPN transistor by increasing the voltage
drop across the parasitic resistance RS.
Dynamic latch-up happens during switching transients,
usually during turn-off, when the parasitic NPN transistor
biased by the displacement current through junction
capacitance Ccb between the deep P+ region and the N-base
region. There are two distinct conditions that may lead to
dynamic latch-up [22-27]. One is when the gate voltage drops
very fast and induces excessive displacement current through
the gate oxide that flows through the parasitic resistance. The
other one is when the off-state collector-emitter voltage is quite
high and induces excessive charging currents within the IGBT
during the switching transient, which will flow through the
parasitic resistance. Both conditions may trigger the parasitic
NPN transistor and eventually lead to latch-up. It should be
noticed that the collector current leading to dynamic latch-up is
lower than that of static latch-up.
When latch-up happens, IGBT will be almost inevitably
damaged due to the loss of gate control, as confirmed by the
2D finite element simulations [28,30]. Therefore, several
methods are proposed to predict latch-up, especially based on
the collector-emitter on-voltage VCE(on) and turn off time
[28,29].
It is worth mentioning, though, that latest-generation
IGBTs with trench-gate structure and heavily doped P-base
region under N-emitter, have been proved to have good latch-
up immunity [31], and latch-up is not a common failure in the
latest devices anymore.
3) Second breakdown.
Second breakdown is a kind of local thermal breakdown for
transistors [32] due to high current stresses, which can also
happen to IGBTs during on-state and turn-off.
The failure mechanism of second breakdown is as follows:
with the increase of current, the collector-base junction space-
charge density increases, and the breakdown voltage decreases,
resulting in a further increase in the current density. This
process continues until the area of the high current density
region reduces down to the minimum area of a stable current
filament. Then, the filament temperature increases rapidly due
to self-heating and a rapid collapse in voltage across IGBT
occurs. This has been comprehensively simulated and
measured in [33]. How to improve IGBT ruggedness at high
current density and prevent second breakdown is still an
interesting research topic [34].
4) Energy shocks.
During short circuit at the on-state, failure may happen due
to high power dissipation. The high power dissipation within a
short time is defined as energy shock. The high short-circuit
E
IE
Rs IG
NPN G
parasitic
Ccb BJT MOSFET
IC main PNP BJT
C
Fig. 3. The equivalent circuit of IGBT [21].
 TABLE I. SUMMARY OF IGBT SHORT-CIRCUIT FAILURE is lightly higher than EC. It is still challenging to determine the
MECHANISMS
exact value of EC, even though many experiments and
Failure
Failure Behavior
Failure Thermal numerical simulations have been done in the prior-art research
Mechanisms Location Behavior [38,39].
During turn-off: VCE
Overheating on
collapses and IC rises
At the edge few peripheral
A recent research also demonstrates this failure mechanism
High voltage after voltage spike in trench gate field-stop structure IGBT by comprehensive
of active cells at first, and
breakdown During turn-on: peak experiments [40]. Since trench-gate field-stop IGBT has a
area then spreads to
IC results in
destruction
the whole chip smaller heat capacity [31,37], a state-of-the-art process has
Static latch-up been proposed which can increase EC by 80% according to
during on-state: high simulations [41]. The basic principle is to use a thicker front
IC leading to loss of Overheating on a side metallization, made of copper instead of aluminum, and a
gate control stable subset of newly developed diffusion soldering process to attach the
Latch-up Active area
Dynamic latch-up cells of the
during transients: device
direct bonded copper (DBC) substrates.
high dv/dt leading to Furthermore, it is worth mentioning that IGBTs can fall
loss of gate control
Local thermal Very high local
into short-circuits due to external causes, like the dynamic
Second
breakdown due to
Emitter
temperature avalanche of freewheeling diodes; therefore it is also crucial to
breakdown regions design high performance freewheeling diodes [42-44].
high currents spots
E>EC:
thermal runaway Emitter
Very high local A summary of IGBT short-circuit failure mechanisms is
temperature presented in Table I. As discussed before, short-circuit currents
after successfully regions
spots
Energy
turned-off inevitably introduce high energy and temperature to IGBT
shocks Al
Local chips, therefore it is important to design an efficient thermal
E<EC: overheating of management to improve the ability of withstanding short-
metallization
degradation of die Al metallization
metallization
layer, bond
layer after 104 circuits in order to have time to detect failure and protect
wires lift-off IGBTs.
cycles

current will result in energy shock and high temperature
[35,36]. However, IGBT will not immediately fail even the
junction temperature exceed the rated temperature. Until
reaching the intrinsic temperature (about 250C for the doped
silicon), further rise in junction temperature would lead to
exponential increase in the carrier concentration and thermal
runaway. With further increase of temperature, the silicon die
may become fatally damaged and the contact metal may also
migrate into the junctions.
Even the short-circuit current is successfully turned-off,
short-circuit failure could still happen after several
microseconds, which is called delayed failure in [31]. It is
verified by experiments and numerical simulation that large
leakage current leads to the thermal runaway [37]. A critical
energy (EC) is proposed to explain the mechanisms of
catastrophic failure and wear out failure under repetitive short-
circuit operations [38]. When short-circuit energy is below EC,
IGBT may survive for more than 104 times repetitive short-
circuit operations before failed. However, when short-circuit
energy is far beyond EC, IGBT may fail after first short-circuit
due to thermal runaway. A further experimental investigation
show that IGBT can turn-off successfully after short-circuit but
fails after several microseconds when the short-circuit energy
IV. FAULT-TOLERANT CIRCUITS
Broadly speaking, it is worth to note first as a general
principle that whatever fault-tolerant circuit or topology adds
complexity and cost to the converter, and may fail by itself. For
this reason, the final reliability-level is a trade-off between
enhancing fault tolerance and increasing weaknesses. With the
above in mind, different fault-tolerant designs at circuit level
have been proposed, which are classified as shown in Fig. 4.
A. Device Redundancy
Contrary to modules, press-pack IGBTs intrinsically short
after a catastrophic failure, due to the absence of bond wires
and direct connection between die and metal contacts [45].
This feature can be profitably used for series redundancy,
where several devices work as a single-switch. Nowadays it is
widely used in traction, high power drives and power
transmission systems [46,47]. However, for the sake of
completeness, it should be pointed out that failed press-pack
IGBTs could be open-circuit after some time, due to the
interaction of molten aluminum (Al), molybdenum (Mo) and Si
leading to various intermetallics, following with poor
conductivity as open-circuit [48].

Fig. 4. Classification of typical fault-tolerant circuits.


Fig. 5. Typical bypass switches redundant circuit [51].
Another way is using bypass switches, as shown in Fig. 5
[49]. The bypass switches are located between the neutral point
and phase output. Failure occurred in switching devices (e.g.
Sap) can be cleared by blowing fuses (e.g. Fa) through turning
on the bypassing switch (e.g. TRa). The circuit operates as a
four-switch three-phase inverter, with lower quality of the
output. This topology can also handle open-phase failure in
motor drive application, which needs to turn on TRn and
change the phase currents to maintain motors torque constant.
This method has been applied in neutral point clamped (NPC)
converters [50]. Similar solutions are also presented in [51-56].
The other method with both series redundancy and bypass
switches is cascaded H-bridge multilevel (CHBM) converter
[57,58] or modular multilevel converter (MMC) [59]. When a
fault occurs to a switch, the faulty H-bridge (or half H-bridge)
cell is bypassed. The output voltage magnitude can be
maintained with an increase of harmonic distortion.
B. Phase Redundancy
This concept consists of introducing an additional phase leg
to replace a faulty phase leg, as shown in Fig. 6 [60]. The fault-
tolerant control scheme is as follows: firstly, the gate driving
signals of the two switches in the faulty leg (e.g. S1 and S2 ) are
set to be zero level; secondly, the suited bidirectional switch is
triggered (e.g. t1); finally, the two switches in redundant phase
(e.g. S7 and S8 ) are controlled by gate driving signals to resume
the role of the two switches in faulty leg. This method has been
applied in three-level converters [61,62]. Five-leg [63,64] and
six-leg converter [65] also have similar fault redundancy.
Fig. 6. Typical phase redundant circuit [61].
TABLE II. SUMMARY OF FAULT-TOLERANT CIRCUITS PERFORMANCE
WITH POWER SWITCHES FAILURE
Failure Types of Power Switch
Fault-tolerant Design
Short-circuit Open-circuit
a b
Press-pack IGBTs in Series
Connection c
Bypass Switches
CHBM/MMC
Four-leg Converter
Five-leg Converter
Six-leg Converter
Matrix Converter
T-type Converter
Improved Boost Converter
HBALSC
a.
Maintain Operation with Normal Output; No fault-tolerant ability; Maintain Operation with Degraded
Output
C. State-redundant Converter
Some circuits have inherent redundant ability, such as the
sparse matrix converter [66-68], and T-type three-level
converter [69], which can handle open-circuit failure of
switches. Moreover, researchers also proposed modifications to
traditional converters to obtain fault-tolerant ability, such as an
improved three-level boost converter for photovoltaic
applications [70], an H-bridge DC-DC converter with auxiliary
leg and selector cells (HBALSC) [71].
A summary of fault-tolerant circuits performance with
respect to power switches failure is presented in Table II. It is
worth mentioning that short-circuit failure is more difficult to
handle than open circuit, and it usually needs very short
detection times.
V. CONCLUSIONS
Catastrophic failure of IGBT is fairly important issues both
in design phase and in operation phase of power electronic
converters. The failure mechanisms of two open-circuit modes
and four short-circuit modes are reviewed in this paper. Even
though the initial triggering factors for those failure modes are
different, the final destruction is almost due to over-
temperature, which reveals the importance of thermal design
and fine thermal management of IGBTs in reliability-critical
applications. At present, plenty of circuit-level fault-tolerant
solutions are available to isolate faulty IGBTs and enhance
converter reliability, which have been discussed in this work.
Exploration of fault-tolerant solutions with reduced complexity
and reduced cost is a hot theme and progresses in this field are
highly expected in the near future.
 REFERENCES
[1] H. Wang, M. Liserre, and F. Blaabjerg, "Toward reliable power
electronics - challenges, design tools and opportunities," IEEE Industrial
Electronics Magazine, vol. 7, no. 2, pp. 17-26, Jun. 2013.
[2] E. Wolfgang, Examples for failures in power electronics systems,
presented at ECPE Tutorial on Reliability Power Electronic System,
Nuremberg, Germany, Apr. 2007.
[3] F. W. Fuchs, Some diagnosis methods for voltage source inverters in
variable speed drives with induction machinesA survey, Proceedings
of IEEE Industrial Electronics Society Annual Conference, pp. 1378-
1385, Nov. 2003.
[4] S. Yang, A. T. Bryant, P. A. Mawby, D. Xiang, L. Ran, and P. Tavner,
An industry-based survey of reliability in power electronic converters,
IEEE Transactions on Industry Applications, vol. 47, no. 3, pp.1441-
1451, May/Jun. 2011.
[5] N. M. Vichare and M. G. Pecht, Prognostics and health management of
electronics, IEEE Transactions on Components and Packaging
Technologies, vol. 29, no. 1, pp. 222-229, Mar. 2006.
[6] C. Busca, R. Teodorescu, F. Blaabjerg, S. Munk-Nielsen, L. Helle, T.
Abeyasekera, and P. Rodriguez, An overview of the reliability
prediction related aspects of high power IGBTs in wind power
applications, Microelectronics Reliability, vol. 51, no. 9-11, pp. 1903-
1907, Sep./Nov. 2011.
[7] M. Ciappa, Selected failure mechanisms of modern power modules,
Microelectronics Reliability, vol. 42, no. 4-5, pp. 653-667, Apr./May.
2002.
[8] M. Ciappa and F. Wolfgang, Lifetime prediction of IGBT modules for
traction applications, Proceedings of 38th Annual IEEE International
Reliability Physics Symposium, pp. 210-216, 2000.
[9] S. Yang, D. Xiang, A. Bryant, P. Mawby, L. Ran, and P. Tavner,
Condition monitoring for device reliability in power electronic
converters: a review, IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics, vol. 25,
no. 11, pp. 2734-2752, Nov. 2010.
[10] J. Flicker, R. Kaplar, B. Yang, M. Marinella, and J. Granata, Insulated
gate bipolar transistor reliability testing protocol for PV inverter
applications, Progress in Photovoltaics: Research and Applications,
doi: 10.1002/pip.2351
[11] K. Rothenhagen and F.W. Fuchs, Performance of diagnosis methods
for IGBT open circuit faults in three phase voltage source inverters for
AC variable speed drives, Proceedings of 2005 European Conference
on Power Electronics and Applications, pp.1-7, 2005.
[12] B. Lu and S. Sharma, A literature review of IGBT fault diagnostic and
protection methods for power inverters, IEEE Transactions on Industry
Applications, vol.45, no.5, pp.1770-1777, Sept./Oct. 2009.
[13] J. Yamashita, A. Uenishi, Y. Tomomatsu, H. Haruguchi, H. Takahashi,
I. Takata, and H. Hagino, A study on the short circuit destruction of
IGBTs, Proceedings of the 5th International Symposium on Power
Semiconductor Devices and ICs. ISPSD '93, pp. 35-40, May 1993.
[14] W.S. Loh, M. Corfield, H. Lu, S. Hogg, T. Tilford, and C.M. Johnson,
Wire bond reliability for power electronic modules - effect of bonding
temperature, Proceedings of International Conference on Thermal,
Mechanical and Multi-Physics Simulation Experiments in
Microelectronics and Micro-Systems, pp.1-6, Apr. 2007.
[15] K. S. Smith, L. Ran, and J. Penman, Real-time detection of intermittent
misfiring in a voltage-fed PWM inverter induction-motor drive, IEEE
Transactions on Indstrial Electronics, vol. 44, no. 4, pp. 468-476, Aug.
1997.
[16] L. Chen, F. Z. Peng, and D. Cao. A smart gate drive with self-diagnosis
for power MOSFETs and IGBTs, Proceedings of 23rd Annual IEEE
Applied Power Electronics Conference and Exposition (APEC2008),
pp.1602- 1607,2008.
[17] C. Delepout, S. Siconolfi, O. Mourra, and F. Tonicell, MOSFET gate
open failure analysis in power electronics, Proceedings of 28th Annual
IEEE Applied Power Electronics Conference and Exposition
(APEC2013), pp.189-196, Mar. 2013.
[18] B. Wang, A. Hu, Y. Tang, and M. Chen, Analysis of voltage
breakdown characteristic of IGBT, Transactions of China
Electrotechnical Society, vol.26, no. 8, pp.145-150, Aug. 2011.
[19] X. Perpi, J. F. Serviere, X. Jorda, S. Hidalgo, J. Urresti-Ibanez, J.
Rebollo, and M. Mermet-Guyennet, Over-current turn-off failure in
high voltage IGBT modules under clamped inductive load, Proceedings
of 13th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications
(EPE '09), pp.1-10, 2009.
[20] I. Masayasu, H. Koji, K. Sachiko, S. Takahide, S. Tonioyuki, F. Takeshi,
and H. Kimimori, Investigation of IGBT turn-on failure under high
applied voltage operation, Microelectronics Reliability, vol. 44, no. 9-
11, pp. 1431-1436, Sep./Nov. 2004.
[21] B. J. Baliga, Fundamental of power semiconductor devices, Springer:
2008, ISBN:9780387473130, pp.938-948.
[22] J. G. Fossum and Y. S. Kim, Static and dynamic latchup in the
LIGBT, IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices, vol. 35, no. 11, pp.
1977- 1985, Nov. 1988.
[23] K. Heumann, Second breakdown and latch-up behavior of IGBTs,
Proceedings of Fifth European Conference on Power Electronics and
Applications. vol.2, pp. 301- 305, 1993.
[24] P. Rose, D. Silber, A. Porst, and F. Pfirsch, Investigations on the
stability of dynamic avalanche in IGBTs, Proceedings of the 14th
International Symposium on Power Semiconductor Devices and ICs,
pp.165-168, 2002.
[25] I. Takata, Non-thermal destruction mechanisms of IGBTs in short
circuit operation, Proceedings of the 14th International Symposium on
Power Semiconductor Devices and ICs, pp.173-176,2002.
[26] K. Oh, Y. Kim, K. Lee, and C. Yun, Investigation of shortcircuit failure
limited by dynamic-avalanche capability in 600-V punchthrough
IGBTs, IEEE Transactions on Device and Materials Reliability, vol. 6,
no. 1, pp. 2-8, Mar. 2006.
[27] F. Iannuzzo, G. Busatto, Physical CAD model for high-voltage IGBTs
based on lumped-charge approach, IEEE Transactions on Power
Electronics, vol. 19, no. 4, pp. 885-893, Jul. 2004.
[28] D. W. Brown, M. Abbas, A. Ginart, I. N. Ali, P. W. Kalgren, and G. J.
Vachtsevanos, Turn-off time as an early indicator of insulated gate
bipolar transistor latch-up, IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics,
vol. 27, no. 2, pp. 479-489, Feb. 2012
[29] N. Patil, J. Celaya, D. Das, K. Goebel, and M. Pecht, Precursor
parameter identification for insulated gate bipolar transistor (IGBT)
prognostics, IEEE Transactions on Reliability, vol. 58, no. 2, pp. 271-
276, Jun. 2009.
[30] A. Benmansour, S. Azzopardi, J. Martin, and E. Woirgard. A step by
step methodology to analyze the IGBT failure mechanisms under short
circuit and turn-off inductive conditions using 2D physically based
device simulation, Microelectronics Reliability, vol. 47, no. 9-11, pp.
1800-1805, Aug./Nov. 2007.
[31] T. Laska, G. Miller, M. Pfaffenlehner, P. Turkes, D. Berger, B.
Gutsmann, P. Kanschat, and M. Munzer, Short circuit properties of
Trench-/Field-Stop-IGBTs-design aspects for a superior robustness,
Proceedings of IEEE 15th International Symposium on Power
Semiconductor Devices and ICs (ISPSD '03), pp. 152-155, 2003.
[32] P. L. Hower and K. Reddi, Avalanche injection and second breakdown
in transistors, IEEE Transanctions on Electron Devices, vol. 17, no. 4,
pp. 320, Apr. 1970.
[33] C. C. Shen, A. R. Hefner, D. W. Berning, and J. B. Bernstein, Failure
dynamics of the IGBT during turn-off for unclamped inductive loading
conditions, Proceedings of IEEE Industry Applications Conference,
vol.2, pp. 831- 839, 1998.
[34] G. Breglio, A. Irace, E. Napoli, M. Riccio, and P. Spirito, Experimental
detection and numerical validation of different failure mechanisms in
IGBTs during unclamped inductive switching, IEEE Transactions on
Electron Devices, vol. 60, no. 2, pp. 563-570, Feb. 2013
[35] A. Benmansour, S. Azzopardi, J. C.Martin, and E.Woirgard, Failure
mechanisms of trench IGBT under various short-circuit conditions,
Proceeding of IEEE Power Electronics Specialists Conference 2007
(PESC 2007), pp. 1923- 1929, 2007.
[36] R. S. Chokhawala, J. Catt, and L. Kiraly, A discussion on IGBT short-
circuit behavior and fault protection schemes, IEEE Transactions on
Industry Applications, vol. 31, no. 2, pp. 256- 263, Mar./Apr. 1995.
[37] M. Otsuki, Y. Onozawa, and T. Matsumoto. A study on the short-
circuit capability of field-stop IGBTs, IEEE Transactions on Electron
Devices, vol. 50, no. 6, pp. 1525- 1531, Jun. 2003.
[38] S. Lefebvre, Z. Khatir, and F. Saint-Eve, Experimental behavior of
single-chip IGBT and COOLMOS devices under repetitive short-circuit
conditions, IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices, vol. 52, no. 2, pp.
276-283, Feb. 2005.
[39] Z. Khatir, S. Lefebvre, and F. Saint-Eve, Experimental and numerical
investigations on delayed short-circuit failure mode of single chip IGBT
devices, Microelectronics Reliability, vol. 47, no. 2-3, pp. 422-428,
Feb./Mar. 2007.
[40] Z. Xu and F. Wang, Experimental investigation of Si IGBT short
circuit capability at 200C, Proceedings of 27th Annual IEEE Applied
Power Electronics Conference and Exposition, pp.162-168, 2012.
[41] F. Hille, F. Umbach, T. Raker, and R. Roth, Failure mechanism and
improvement potential of IGBTs short circuit operation, Proceedings
of 22nd International Symposium on Power Semiconductor Devices and
ICs (ISPSD2010), pp. 3336, 2010.
[42] M.T. Rahimo, N.Y.A. Shammas, Freewheeling diode reverse-recovery
failure modes in IGBT applications, IEEE Transactions on Industry
Applications, vol. 37, no. 2, pp. 661-670, Mar./Apr. 2001.
[43] R. Wu, F. Blaabjerg, H. Wang, and M. Liserre, Overview of
catastrophic failures of freewheeling diodes in power electronic
circuits, acceepted by 24th European Symposium on Reliability of
Electron Devices, Failure Physics and Analysis (ESREF 2013).
[44] J. Lutz, U. Scheuermann, H. Schlangenotto, and R. de Doncker,
Semiconductor power devices, Springer: 2011, ISBN: 3642111246.
[45] S. Eicher, M. Rahimo, E. Tsyplakov, D. Schneider, A. Kopta, U.
Schlapbach, and E. Carroll, 4.5kV press pack IGBT designed for
ruggedness and reliability, Proceedings of 39th IAS Annual Meeting
Industry Applications Conference, vol. 3, pp. 1534- 1539, 2004.
[46] Y. Uchida, Y. Seki, Y. Takahashi, and M. Ichijoh, Development of
high power press-pack IGBT and its applications, Proceedings of 22nd
International Conference on Microelectronics, vol.1, pp. 125-129, 2001.
[47] O. S. Senturk, S. Munk-Nielsen, R. Teodorescu, L. Helle, and P.
Rodriguez, Electro-thermal modeling for junction temperature cycling-
based lifetime prediction of a press-pack IGBT 3L-NPC-VSC applied to
large wind turbines, Proceedings of IEEE Energy Conversion Congress
and Exposition (ECCE2011), pp. 568-575, Sept. 2011
[48] S. Gunturi, D. Schneider, and C. Res, On the operation of a press pack
IGBT module under short circuit conditions, IEEE Transanctions on
Advanced Packaging, vol. 29, no. 3, pp. 433440, Aug. 2006.
[49] T. A. Lipo, T. M. Jahns, and S. E. Schulz, Fault tolerant three-phase
AC motor drive topologies: a comparison of features, cost, and
limitations, IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics, vol. 19, no. 4,
pp. 1108-1116, Jul. 2004.
[50] S. Li and L. Xu, Strategies of fault tolerant operation for three-level
PWM inverters, IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics, vol. 21, no.
4, pp. 933-940, Jul. 2006.
[51] F. Richardeau, Z. Dou, J. M. Blaquiere, E. Sarraute, D. Flumian, and F.
Mosser, Complete short-circuit failure mode properties and comparison
based on IGBT standard packaging. application to new fault-tolerant
inverter and interleaved chopper with reduced parts count, Proceedings
of the 14th European Conference on Power Electronics and
Applications (EPE 2011), pp.1-9, 2011.
[52] J. J. Park, T. J. Kim, and D. S. Hyun, Study of neutral point potential
variation for three-level NPC inverter under fault condition,
Proceedings of 34th IEEE Annual Conference of the IEEE Industrial
Electronics Society (IECON2008), pp. 983-988, Nov. 2008.
[53] J. C. Lee, T. J. Kim, D. W. Kang, and D. S. Hyun, A control method
for improvement of reliability in fault tolerant NPC inverter system,
Proceedings of 37th IEEE Annual Power Electronics Specialist
Conference (PESC2006), pp. 1-5, Jun. 2006.
[54] J. Li, S. Bhattacharya, and A. Q. Huang, Three-level active neutral
point clamped (ANPC) converter with fault tolerant ability,
Proceedings of 24th Annual IEEE Applied Power Electronics
Conference and Exposition (APEC2009), pp. 840-845, Feb. 2009.
[55] T. Bruckner, S. Bernet, and H. Guldner, The active NPC converter and
its loss-balancing control, IEEE Transanctions on Industrial
Electronics, vol. 52, no. 3, pp. 855-868, Jun. 2005.
[56] S. Ceballos, J. Pou, E. Robles, J. Zaragoza, and J. L. Martin,
Performance evaluation of fault tolerant neutral-point-clamped
converters, IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics, vol. 57, no. 8,
pp. 2709-2718, Aug. 2010.
[57] L. Maharjan, T. Yamagishi, H. Akagi, and J. Asakura, Fault-tolerant
operation of a battery-energy-storage system based on a multilevel
cascade PWM converter with star configuration, IEEE Transanctions
on Power Electronics, vol. 25, no. 9, pp. 2386-2396, Sep. 2010.
[58] M. A. Parker, N. Chong, and R. Li, Fault-tolerant control for a modular
generator-converter scheme for direct-drive wind turbines, IEEE
Transanctions on Industry Electronics, vol. 58, no. 1, pp. 305-315, Jan.
2011.
[59] S. Shao, P.W. Wheeler, J.C. Clare, and A.J.Watson, Fault detection for
modular multilevel converters based on sliding mode observer, IEEE
Transactions on Power Electronics, vol. 28, no. 11, pp. 4867-4872, Nov.
2013.
[60] S. Karimi, P. Poure, and S. Saadate, Fast power switch failure detection
for fault tolerant voltage source inverters using FPGA, IET Power
Electronics, vol. 2, no. 4, pp. 346-354, Jul. 2009.
[61] S. Ceballos, J. Pou, E. Robles, I. Gabiola, J. Zaragoza, J. L. Villate, and
D. Boroyevich, Three-level converter topologies with switch
breakdown fault-tolerance capability, IEEE Transactions on Industrial
Electronics, vol. 55, no. 3, pp. 982-995, Mar. 2008.
[62] S. Ceballos, J. Pou, J. Zaragoza, E. Robles, J. L. Villate, and J. L.
Martin, Soft-switching topology for a fault-tolerant neutral-point-
clamped converter, Procedings of IEEE International Symposium on
Industrial Electronics (ISIE2007), pp. 3186-3191, Jun. 2007.
[63] M. Shahbazi, P. Poure, S. Saadate, and M. R. Zolghadri, Fault-tolerant
five-leg converter topology with FPGA-based reconfigurable control,
IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics, vol. 60, no. 6, pp. 2284-
2294, Jun. 2013
[64] M. Salehifar, R. S. Arashloo, M.-E. Manuel, V. Sala, and L. Romeral,
Fault tolerant operation of a five phase converter for PMSM drives,
IEEE 28th Annual Applied Power Electronics Conference and
Exposition (APEC2013), pp.1177-1184, Mar. 2013.
[65] M. Shahbazi, P. Poure, S. Saadate, and M.R. Zolghadri, FPGA-based
reconfigurable control for fault-tolerant back-to-back converter without
redundancy, IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics, vol.60, no.8,
pp.3360-3371, Aug. 2013.
[66] S. Kwak, Fault-tolerant structure and modulation strategies with fault
detection method for matrix converters, IEEE Transactions on Power
Electronics, vol. 25, no. 5, pp. 1201-1210, May 2010.
[67] S. Khwan-On, L. De Lillo, L. Empringham, and P.Wheeler, Fault-
Tolerant Matrix Converter Motor Drives With Fault Detection of Open
Switch Faults, IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics, vol. 59,
no. 1, pp. 257-268, Jan. 2012.
[68] L. Eunsil, and K. B. Lee, Fault diagnosis for a sparse matrix converter
using current patters, Proceedings of 27th Annual IEEE Applied Power
Electronics Conference and Exposition, pp.1549-1554, Feb. 2012.
[69] U. M. Choi, K. B. Lee, and F. Blaabjerg, Diagnosis and tolerant
strategy of an open-switch fault for T-type three-level inverter systems,
IEEE Transactions on Industry Applications, to be published in 2014,
early access:
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/articleDetails.jsp?tp=&arnumber=6542725
&queryText%3DDiagnosis+and+tolerant+strategy+of+an+open-
switch+fault+for+T-type+three-level+inverter+systems.
[70] E. Ribeiro, A. J. M. Cardoso, and C. Boccaletti, Fault-tolerant strategy
for a photovoltaic DC--DC converter, IEEE Transactions on Power
Electronics, vol. 28, no. 6, pp. 3008-3018, Jun. 2013.
[71] K. Ambusaidi, V. Pickert, B. Zahawi, New circuit topology for fault
tolerant H-bridge DCDC converter, IEEE Transactions on Power
Electronics, vol. 25, no. 6, pp. 1509-1516, Jun. 2010.